Roman Cieślewicz Retrospective Exhibition

Klimowski curated the 2010 ‘Roman Cieślewicz Retrospective Exhibition’ in collaboration with Professor David Crowley and Jeff Willis (RCA) and Anna Grabowska-Konwent (National Museum, Poznan, Poland). The exhibition was the first comprehensive introduction of the world-famous graphic designer to the British public, addressing various aspects of his work including visual journalism, poster design, lettering, collage and mass production, alongside related ephemera. Raising the profile of graphic design at the RCA, the exhibition focused on the dramatic force a designer can generate for communicating public messages in the cultural, ideological and commercial fields.

Klimowski undertook research in Warsaw and Poznan to select the works for the exhibition from the collections of the National Museum in Poznan, which has the largest collection of Cieślewicz’s works in the world, and the library of the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, to gather historical and contextual materials from their archives. A catalogue and B1-format poster were produced to accompany the exhibition, and the curators also organised exhibition workshops with the design collective Åbäke, and exhibition tours.

The exhibition was widely covered by the press, including The Guardian, Creative Review and Design Week in the UK and Wprost news magazine in Poland. It had an enthusiastic coverage by EYE blog and was filmed by BBC Four and Polish TV. Over 3,000 visitors saw the exhibition and 1,000 copies of the catalogue, produced and designed by Klimowski, Crowley and Willis with a preface to the exhibition, were distributed. The Polish Ambassador launched the exhibition, which was the final event of the Year of Polish Culture in the UK.